CHINESE STOWAWAYS

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2455, 20 March 1909, Page 2

CHINESE STOWAWAYS

TH ETO RTURE ,TH EY -ENDU RE.# .T’ OPIUM DISCOVERED, r r WAI KONG’S WARNING. “■Hong Kong, 11th January, 1909. “Sir,—l beg to inform you there are 60 passengers go on board the s.s. Orange Branch on the 11th January, 1909, from-Hong Kong to Sydney, that passengers are kept in the storeroom: in the after-hold inside the main hold, lower deck, the stewards, cooks, and boys doing this in Hong Kong, the headmen named, Hung Cow, and Sum - Leung, in Queen’s Road s east, No. 312, Ist floor;—Yours truly; . . “WAI KONG. ' “Also s about 3,000 boxes opium in

that place.” - This was the letter received lately bythe Melbourne Customs Department, and handed on to Detective-Inspector Christie, that he.might sift the wheat of it, if. any, from the chaff (says the Melbourne “Argus”). - -. . The “Orange Branch” is a vessel of 3,435 tons, commanded by Captain J. M'Lelland, - and left Muroran, Japan, for Sydney, in the beginning of February. She did not put into Sydney,: but called at the Heads, and was ordered to Melbourne. If she had Chinese stowaways- aboard, they would, reasoned the Customs officers, be aboard when the; steamer swung to her anchor under the winking eye of the Gellibrand light. Unless they were landed in a smooth sea. upon, the coast, or unless, indeed, Wai Kong’s letter were a hoax. In dealing with Chinese stowaways the Customs officers, usually find an “unless” or two. They move in a very mysterious way. . : : Y #'"' i ”~ So the “Orange Branch” stood away from Sydney Heads and butted her way down past Jervis Bay, past Moruyay Gabo, Wilson’s Promontory, and the watchers on the lighthouse towers put their fingers to the keys, and the messages came in to the waiting Customs officials. And on Saturday evening Queenscliff.signalled the “wanted” vessel past the Rip at 6 o’clock, under a grey, smoking rain, and she nosed her way up the channel till the red and white flicker of Gellibrand gave her pause. Then down anolior, and the Hong Kong mud on the flukes mixed with the Port Philip silt. . She swung in the tide at lQLao’clock,. a gaunt black shape, against the rain-blurred lights of Port Melbourne, across the bay. As she lay under the clearing sky a Cus-toms-patrol launch slipped out from Williamstown, and cruised about her all night. A launchy which put off with letters, was chased and searched. Nobody has business to take letters aboard any steamer until the doctor had passed her. At last came dawn, showing up the “Orange Branch” as a large turret steamer, of some 3.000 tons, piled up like a timber-yard with 7,000 logs of Japanese pine, strutted and bound from stanchions * oyer her ugly whalebacks. With the dawn came the doctor, and a clean bill of health was given to the ship, with its 42 Chinese. • At half-past 9 Detective-Inspector Christie,- Boardmg-inspeetor O’Brien, and: nine Customs men, started from Queen’s Wharf to search, the vessel. At about 10 o’clock they were on. board, they searched from the bilgewater in the shaft- tunnel to tho crows’uiest. They tapped bulkheads and looked un-der-shelves and bunks and cargo. Not a pigtail came to light, except those of the crew, who smiled in a pitying manner at the strange energy , of‘the “Fan If wai. P Tho smelly little holesin which they, existed were turned inside out by Customs officers with delicately-upturn-ed noses at the scent, which ‘is a commonplace to a Chinese sailor. But neither the 60 “passengers” nor the 3,000 tins of opium were discovered. At last, in the engineroom, behind a tank, were unearthed three mats full of -lib opium tins —53 in all—worth in Little Bourke-street from £2OO to £250. They were brought upon deck, and sent down into the launch, and the-happy smile faded a little from the faces of some of the greasers. {,v ... ■

Yet one cannot accuse Wai Kong-; of hallucinatiaons. Here were 53 tins"of least asixtieth part of 3,000. And, indeed, there were Chinese stowaways—l 3 of them, nearly a whole quarter of Kong’s tally. But these were discovered after 21 days of purgatory, and thrown ashore/ at Otaru, in the North of Japan. How they were found is. another story—the story of Mr Moodie, 'chief officer. •

*' “Alter-11 days from Hong Kong, the steamer .had 'arrived at Otaru. At Otaru the timber earn© aboard for 10 days.: On the last day of loading, Mr .‘•foodie found occasion to visit the storeroom aft. On top of some bags of rice, and far back in the gloom, ho observed a blanket. He pulled it, and beheld the mildly-inquiring face of an ancient Chinese of some 70 summers. He made, a grab, ; but the relic disappeared, and concurrently two other, pigtails glided like snakes into a sort of warren under 'fhe bags. Mr. Moodie stood by the door and sent an unwilling “boy” forward for Captain Mclvelland. Betweeen them the officers dragged out three Chinese—the ancient who had given tho - thing away, and, two others. To inquiry, ■ the marl} who spoke ‘ ‘pidg,n • pretty badly > responded, “No more.” Captain McLelland sent for a. rliinoccros-hlde “sjambok.” To inquiry directed upon new principles, the reply, “One more” was obtained. Still further inquiry with the sjambok elicited the fact that there were 13 stowaways. When even this direct method, added to persuasive remarks about shooting, failed to obtain results, Captain McLelland decided that he had caught the whole unlucky 13. A terrible sightthey were—half fjjind in the unaccustomed light,, with limbs swollen from the cramp of 20 days, boils from head to foot from their diet of raw: rice and potatoes,' and condensed milk sucked from holes in the tins. The first four were found beneath a wooden flooring, lying upon the,bare iron of the hull above the screw, ' with,the temperature at lOdeg. Fahr. The cubic air space for the four was less than 100 ft, The other nine were dragged from a hole which had been cut in the decking of the. store-room. The planks had been sawn so that a close examination might have detected it. But even then the cuts would have boon mistakou for ixio joined ends of the boards. Down there against the throbbing, freezing skin or the ship it was pitch 'dark, and the smell was almost unendurable a badger’s den was eau-de-cologne to it. those who knew what sea-sickness may be, alleviated as far as possible by fiesh air and the . attentions of the steward, •may form some idea of it in a temperature 22deg. below freezing point, pinned where, movement is impossible, and standing up a vain dream, 15’ human being packed into a space less than an ordinary suburban bathroom. Yet these

their native land to one which must surely be painted to them in pure gold. However, here were the abandoned nests, and search revealed others of the same kind deep below the waterline in the inky .blackness ...of . the forepeak. But these, said Mr. Moodio, had been in "the ship for four years untenanted. Wherefore, at about 1 o’clock, the quest of the Customs officials was given over,, and with the captured opium the searchers steamed back .to town in the launch. Not that they believe this to be all the opium on board. Nobody who has seen a Customs, search can have any idea of the myriad of dark hiding places aboard a 3000-ton steamer, loaded 10ft over her decks with 7000 logs of Japanese pine. But the officers will watch as the cargo is taken out of the Orange Branch; they will examine each lo«- of .7000 for marks, of the saw. it Kong’s 3000 tins of opium ar ; e on board, it is going to be a very difficult mattei to get it off to its consignee.